The 2022-23 Budget to be unveiled by Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po on Feb 23 will cover a period spanning two administrations, of which the current term ends on June 30. Hong Kong is in the midst of a historic transformation; the governing philosophy and policy direction of the next administration may differ from those of the current administration. The upcoming budget, therefore, should strike a balance between ensuring stability in the short term and pursuing growth in the future, with an emphasis on the former.
Indeed, the need to ensure short-term stability while pursuing long-term growth was emphasized in the Central Economic Work Conference held in Beijing in December. This socioeconomic development strategy, which was taken in response to the paradigm shift in the global governance catalyzed by a once-in-a-century pandemic, is also good for Hong Kong under the current situation.
For now, stability for Hong Kong is invariably associated with reining in COVID-19. Although it is incumbent on the financial secretary to provide the necessary backing for anti-pandemic initiatives of policy bureaus, it is up to him to decide whether he should respond to political parties’ demand for the issuance of consumption vouchers to help relieve the damage caused by the pandemic to residents’ income and the local economy.
My personal judgment accords with the said demand for further economic relief and stimulus. Both residents and service industries have been feeling the pinch of COVID-19, many of whom can barely make ends meet or are in the red after the pandemic has plagued Hong Kong for over two years. It does behoove the government to give them a hand. The HK$5,000 ($640) consumption vouchers issued previously proved to be a well-received policy in stimulating local spending and the economy. Building on this success can further reinvigorate the ailing service sectors, and even a small amount of subsidy can serve as relief to the pandemic fatigue befalling the public.
This public aspiration may come true as Chan recently hinted that the actual fiscal deficit of the current financial year would be far less than the previous projection, suggesting that the government has the financial capacity for delivering further economic relief. Be it in the form of consumption vouchers or cash, the anticipated financial subsidy shall be dispatched in a way that ensures administrative efficiency and speed of delivery into the hands of the public.
Conceivably, old-school civil servants, especially senior government officials, have reservations about handing out further economic relief, on the grounds that the government, unlike political parties, shall not succumb to “populist” demand. Their dedication to preserving the fiscal reserve is not beyond our understanding; after all, they count on it for their future pensions. But it is rude to label public demand for bailouts as “populism” or to denounce political parties’ attempt to reflect public sentiment as succumbing to populist demand under the current situation. Civil servants are the least-affected group during the pandemic, with their salary entitlements remaining intact. Visiting the local community and listening to the voices of the grassroots would probably be the best way to get informed of their predicaments under the specter of the pandemic, which justify the demand for more financial subsidies.
The last budget of the incumbent administration should provide a summary of the measures adopted in the previous four budgets that were dedicated to Hong Kong’s long-term development, with a view to assessing whether the corresponding expenditures were fit for the purpose. For instance, in examining the initiatives targeting the city’s innovation and technology, which concerns the city’s long-term development, one should evaluate the consistency of the proposed measures in the previous four budgets; whether the relevant funding moves served the purpose; what I&T achievements have been made by the incumbent administration; and whether the sector growth has adequately met the requirements in the Outline Development Plan for the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.
Implementing the Outline Development Plan for the GBA will require continuity in policymaking across two administrations. Therefore, the aforementioned summary in the upcoming budget would serve as a good reference for formulating measures and appropriations for the new financial year, which will hopefully be retained by the succeeding administration.
In his 2022 New Year address, President Xi Jinping remarked that the concerns of the people are what he always cares about, and the aspirations of the people are what he always strives for. It is imperative for the SAR government to also embrace this “people-centric” governing principle, which should rise above the capitalism Hong Kong is practicing. This is because the evolution of capitalism over the past few centuries has been chiefly driven by the aspiration of the people for socioeconomic progress. Elsewhere, liberal capitalism is dwindling in its influence, and the call to reform capitalism is on the rise in the West. With that in mind, can the patriot-administered capitalist Hong Kong still put up with the reality that a quarter of the city’s population are in poverty and some 200,000 residents are living in substandard living quarters?
The author is a senior research fellow of China Everbright Holdings.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.